I was thinking, why is it a bad choice to get into art because of manga? what is it about manga that makes it a bad choice? aside from the bad habits that coincide with it? everyone seems to sometimes gripe about it on here so I'm wondering what are your 2 cents about this art forum?

I think the bad habits alone are a decent enough reason to discourage it. Some people just don't have a taste for it. And seeing that everywhere can bring a bad taste to disgust.
If someone wants to draw anime and you're only advice is not to draw anime you're pretty silly. Let people draw what they wanna draw, as long as they aren't being a dick about it or finding a way to weaponize it.

At 7/17/13 01:42 PM, M-Maher wrote:
I was thinking, why is it a bad choice to get into art because of manga? what is it about manga that makes it a bad choice? aside from the bad habits that coincide with it? everyone seems to sometimes gripe about it on here so I'm wondering what are your 2 cents about this art forum?

Cause 99% of the people who start with manga, never add anything of value. They just redraw the same goddamn characters with slightly different hairstyles and colours. Doesn't help that many manga completely ignore the more technical aspect such as proportions so many people with that mindset don't like it one bit either.

Aside from that, it's mostly a very big popularity 'fad' and will instantly show its age the moment it's over. Just look at deviantart with all their "commisions" and the fact they have to point out something is "original content" when that's ought to be the goddamn rule.

A rather disgusting-looking git that should have been disposed of ages ago.

At 7/17/13 01:42 PM, M-Maher wrote:
I was thinking, why is it a bad choice to get into art because of manga? what is it about manga that makes it a bad choice? aside from the bad habits that coincide with it? everyone seems to sometimes gripe about it on here so I'm wondering what are your 2 cents about this art forum?

It's not bad to GET INTO art because of it. And you already mentioned "bad habits" that occur usually. I think manga art (let's agree that we all know what is meant by that, even if we use japanese words wrong somehow) can be great. It's just very common that people reproduce the same old stuff over and over again. Not just visually, even vast numbers of stories are pretty unoriginal. I have seen too much DragonBallSonicPokemon-ish faces to find it interesting. That does not mean none of it was interesting originally.

This might also go hand in hand with the often sexualized nature of young girls, which is very much frowned upon in Western cultures. Many anime fans will find ways to 'defend' this, but in the end, they can not deny this is very regularly a factor.

This does not mean anime as a whole is to be ostracized though. There are plenty very well executed mangas and animes (of which I'm sure Aigis can link us a ton of examples) and there genuine artists who DO add interpretations and well thought through critiques on the art style as a whole, while still maintaining their personal elements. These, though, are mostly more culturally developed and openminded than their favourite episodes from Naruto and the Gundam series.

A rather disgusting-looking git that should have been disposed of ages ago.

In general it's probably a bad idea to start out drawing with any consistent specific type of abstraction in how you draw things, because that tends to limit your ability to draw outside of that style.

That's not limited to manga, though. Manga is just a bit more ubiquitous in tha regard.

What exactly is being discussed? Manga or some particular art style that's being associated with it? As far as I'm aware, the artwork varies just as widely in manga, style and quality wise, as they do in its western counterpart (i.e. a lot).

Really, when people mention the word manga, my mind jumps to panels from the works of mangaka such as Junji Ito, Katsuhiro Otomo, Suehiro Maruo and even Shintaro Kago. All of whom have very different styles.

Manga is a bad choice for a beginer because manga does not approach life in a realistic way but rather has its own rules for everything. If you have read a "how to draw manga book" you will notice that the author usually has a section comparing manga with realistic anatomy. Now you may not be drawing realism , like me , you may dont give a shit about it BUT realism is the basis. Before you create a monster you must know how an animal body works for example. If you know the basic body structure of human and animal , you can come up with amazing fictional stuff but , without this knowledge its way too hard trust me. For example , an arm , be it human , werewolf , monstrous , or whatever , must have certain muscles to make it believable , make it look like something that can actually move and function.

The other reason why manga is a bad choice is cause its the easy way. Manga has a certain list of features. Bad guy eyes , cute girl eyes , angry mouth , happy mouth etc. This sounds appealing to someone who hasnt developed his skills yet but its a trap! It leads to stagnacy and you learn nothing from it , just draw the same 3-4 characters again and again with some different base colours and details. No easy way is the right way remember that. You must learn how life works , then you can play with it however you like be it manga , cartoon , realism or any other kind of style.

So , to sum it up , manga is not the devil but if you feel like drawing manga , dont start with it. It will lead you to a dead end. First study how real beings work. Then you can incorporate this knowledge in any style you wish! I hope i helped and im happy to discuss about it further :)

There is. Its just that people who have mastered it are able to take steps away from the core and form a personal style based on the principles of manga.

Meaning there is no certain way to draw it if people can add personal style to it and still call it manga.

No sir , i think you misunderstand. Manga has certain principles. I have two manga tutorial books in my pc that say so. Manga teaches you how to draw life. Its like another "realism". It has certain rules for the way you draw eyes , female and male bodies and features of the human being in general. A pro can add some of his own ideas into this concept , overide some rules and include other stuff but he is still based on the core.

Im not being a hater here , dont take me wrong , im just expressing my experience. If you take 10 random mangas that were published the last 5 years and are meant for kids for example ( i think they are called sonen or shounen or smthin ) you will realise that the difference in style is miniscule. At least to most of them. And we are talking about pros , lets not even get into the actual topic we are here , the beginers.

Also , there has been a dispute about it before so let me clarify this. When i say manga i mean the certain style of art , not every comic produced in eastern countries.

There is. Its just that people who have mastered it are able to take steps away from the core and form a personal style based on the principles of manga.

Meaning there is no certain way to draw it if people can add personal style to it and still call it manga.

Also , there has been a dispute about it before so let me clarify this. When i say manga i mean the certain style of art , not every comic produced in eastern countries.

But manga literally is every Japanese comic book, manga is the word for Japanese comic. The first manga's look like in the 40's looked more like Archie than the ones you see now. The style that people use now just became popular in the West which is why more people have adopted it.

Also , there has been a dispute about it before so let me clarify this. When i say manga i mean the certain style of art , not every comic produced in eastern countries.

But manga literally is every Japanese comic book, manga is the word for Japanese comic. The first manga's look like in the 40's looked more like Archie than the ones you see now. The style that people use now just became popular in the West which is why more people have adopted it.

I said so again sir , i know what the term manga means but it has come to represent the specific artstyle used by the majority of the eastern comic artists. At least this is how it is in the western part of the world. When the OP asked , he was obviously refering to an art style and not to a part of the world.

I said so again sir , i know what the term manga means but it has come to represent the specific artstyle used by the majority of the eastern comic artists. At least this is how it is in the western part of the world. When the OP asked , he was obviously refering to an art style and not to a part of the world.

Which is why I said what I said in my first post. Manga has no certain style. People art just rolling with what has become popular, just as they have in Western comics and cartoons. So I say this again to the OP there is nothing wrong with starting with Manga.

I said so again sir , i know what the term manga means but it has come to represent the specific artstyle used by the majority of the eastern comic artists. At least this is how it is in the western part of the world. When the OP asked , he was obviously refering to an art style and not to a part of the world.

Which is why I said what I said in my first post. Manga has no certain style. People art just rolling with what has become popular, just as they have in Western comics and cartoons. So I say this again to the OP there is nothing wrong with starting with Manga.

Sir im not sure what you dont understand. There are two meanings for the word manga. One is the art style. The other is just the japanese word for comic. We are obviously discussing the first term which is the art style. I dont know what else i can say to make it even more clear. I believe i have said already enough. My first post stands uncorrected , people can go on and read it , especially the OP.

Sir im not sure what you dont understand. There are two meanings for the word manga. One is the art style. The other is just the japanese word for comic. We are obviously discussing the first term which is the art style.

Well I mentioned that in my post earlier. Everybody knows what we are talking about wether or not we're using the correct term. "The art style that is used in the majority of modern japanese comics and comics inspired by japanese comic" is just too long to be used in a conversation. And when you know exactly what people are talking about, what use is there in derailing the whole thread about it? I call it manga art, because 999 out of 1000 people will think of the same visuals I do, when they read that word. Gimme a better word if you can.

You guys simply refuse to accept the fact that in western culture , manga refers to the particular art style. I have books in my pc saying "How To draw Manga". This may be a bit tryhard , i could put more effort to it too but lets take this pic i made as an example here. These are characters from 4 different popular mangas i chose randomly. Lets try and spot the differences shall we? I bet that only people who are actually reading one of these will be able to spot out who made what. Bot no , you guys will keep refusing that the pictures are done after a certain art style because you are simply prefixed to an already outmatched opinion.

Words don't have a fixed meaning; meaning lies in the use of words.
There is nothing wrong with starting with manga if you consider the (true) broad definition; HOWEVER most poeple that get into art for manga (and probably OP too) don't use that definition.

As previously stated, we all know what is meant when someone on here says "Anime" or "Manga" as a style. It's no different than saying "realism" "modern art" "abstract" or "surrealism". All of those movements and styles had extremely specific dates and rules to them, and are barely close to what people think of when they hear those words today, so lets not argue over what "manga" really means, that's a different discussion.

I think the appeal of manga as a starting point is that it seems easy to replicate, and can produce quality results with little effort to a beginner. When i started to take drawing more seriously I started by drawing looney toons and cartoons shows i was watching. It was a fun exercise, and again, produced nice looking results despite the fact i couldn't really draw and didn't really know what i was doing. I dabbled in anime and manga styles and found them to be even easier to replicate and achieve a nice looking piece when it was done. However I quickly saw that unless I got really really good in other styles I would just be stuck using the exact same techniques for every drawing and it wouldnt really help me make a finished piece.

I look at it in a similar way to people gravitating towards abstract and non-representational art, without ever considering attempting something in a realistic manner. Lots of people seem to forsake realism because it requires much more skill and work in their minds to make something worthwhile than randomly throwing a few shapes and colors around. The irony being that with abstract stuff you almost have to know more artistic rules to making a piece work than with realistic stuff. Realistic stuff is generally judged on "does it look like the things its supposed to look like, even a little bit". Abstract stuff is more judged on "what is the concept of this piece? why abstract? does it achieve its concept? does it feel right?". Most people don't understand what it really takes to make a functional abstract piece, because they are looking at it from a 100% visual aesthetic level and not really analyzing all that is there. The same applies to anime, they see the style, like it and want to replicate it without really understanding the underlying skills and techniques that make it work.

i'm going to go the other way and say manga might actually be a good place to start, you can learn the basic concepts to apply to other styles. stuff such as the concept of body proportions etc. however i think everyone should attempt to learn multiple styles to improve and do what you enjoy to begin with. manga itself contains many different types of styles within itself. so it wouldn't be impossible to move in a more traditional direction for someone that started with manga. plus it takes a long time to get good, and even then you'll likely never find your work satisfying as you'll always want to improve.

people might be against manga as they assume it's all full of weird Japanese crap, i think if people were to look a little deeper they might find some good story writing and art (plus a bit of weird Japanese crap).